Designing Interactions: Futures and Alternative Nows

Chapter Takeaways

• There are many viewpoints from which to approach the future (e.g. artistic vs technological).
  
• Creativity may simply mean becoming more aware of the unique objects/events around you.
• Even unscientific research based in reality can serve to provoke important discussions.
• Design leaders can be born from groups or as solo practitioners.
• Small computers may not fit into a traditional GUI model and will need to develop their own equivalent standard.

Introduction

Instead of need being purely functional, we are looking at the idea of a more emotional and psychological need. - Dunne and Raby

• The "alternative now" that Dunne and Raby offer is something beyond the obvious functionality of the consumer product: they look for more complicated pleasures that hover on the border of the subversive and artistic, but always offering some comment on humanity.
• Perhaps a digital parallel to the Arts & Crafts movement in reaction to the Industrial Revolution.

Fiona Raby and Tony Dunne

• Exploring something between reality and fiction.
• Founding members of the Computer Related Design (CRD) Research Studio at the Royal College of Art in London.
• Work in three overlapping areas: technology as medium, as a product, and as critique.

Complicated Pleasures

• Always looking for example of reality that is stranger than fiction.
• With physical products, our pleasure are sensual and physical. With digital, they are more imaginative.
• Leave room for interpretation.

Placebo Project

• Developed a collection of electronic objects to explore mental well-being in relation to domestic electromagnetic fields.
• Wanted to explore how people would relate to these fake fields.
• Findings grounded in reality but not in science.

Existential Design

• See the role of design as a medium for debate,
• Encourage designers to think up both positive and negative scenarios.
• Energy Futures, London Science Museum: created 3 potential scenarios for the future of energy.
• Teddy bear blood bag: use the meat/blood of animals to power everyday objects.
• Poo lunch box: children bring poo home from school to be used as energy at home.
• Hydrogen: every home and family is responsible for contribution hydrogen. Even have a brand around the family hydrogen output.
• Consuming monsters: big, perfect and infectious: an existential shopping mall concept that contain biotechnology map.
• Utility Pets: xeno-transplantation. Raise a pig with personalized DNA from the time it is an embryo.

John Maeda

• An interaction designer, computer artist, and teacher.
• Wrote Maeda@Media.
• Studying engineering at MIT.
• Product Design at Tsukuba University.
• Created work that was both artistic and technical.
• Professor at the MIT Media Lab, directing Aesthetics & Computing Group.
• Archived works at www.maedastudio.com.
• Maeda Studio is not a big company, merely his desk at home.
• His vision of the future: simplicity.

Simplicity

• Naomi Enami, Japan's pioneer of interactive media: "You have to go into education to build the people who will one day come and destroy you."
• Maeda@Media was completely written and designed only by John Maeda.
• Wants the arts to be more appreciated, because he sees it as a necessity for our future.
• Leading towards "simplicity" by creating a new Arts & Crafts movement.

Jun Rekimoto

• Established Interaction Laboratory in 1999 at Sony to investigate the future of HCI and digital lifestyles.
• Interested in designing interactions for portable computers, situated in the real world and augmented by computer-based information.
• Small computers may not fit into a traditional GUI model and will need to develop their own equivalent standard.
  

The Interaction Laboratory

• Lab full of prototypes.
• Description of 4 projects:
• ActiveInk computational ink: will put clouds on the drawing if you choose to draw the sky.
• BlockJam interactive music cubes: build like Lego to create musical compositions.
• ToughEngine tactile feedback for touch panels: vibration in response to your touch.
• Time-Machine Computing navigation system: organizing your files by time.

Augmented Reality

• Rekimoto thinks that AR is more than just augmented view has an overlay.
• Sees it as any computer that can be aware of the real world, this includes the cell phone.

Ubiquitous Computing

• Pick-and-drop: pick an object up in one computer and drop it in another. Building on the concept of drag-and-drop across platforms. Example - walk in front of a projector screen and begin to control it with your cell phone.
  
• Gestural interfaces: likely to be the preferred method of input, but has the problem of recall instead of recognition. Gestures should be mimetic rather than symbolic.
  
• Ubiquitous computing enabled by sensors and receptors: context aware and adaptive systems. People are not trying to find the equivalent of HTML for physical objects.
  

Designing Interactions: Multisensory and Multimedia

Chapter Takeaways

• We are only beginning to take advatage of our senses in the digital space.
• We are spacial thinkers - helps orient and remember.
• Tactile qualities convey significant amount of information.
• Tagible User Interaces (TUI) are currently real input and fake output.
• Abacus as an example of a true TUI with sound and physical form providing both input and output.
• Create and utilize environmental affordances.
• We remember things if they are repeated or if they are suprising.
• Even if the design is good, must remember to include engaging content.
• Do user research, but also include business input.
• Go against convention.
• All design, visual and audio, has an emotional component. Use it.
  

Introduction

• We have 5 senses, how sad our connection to computers is "sensory deprived and physically limited".
• Chapter to explore opportunities for interaction design to become multisensory and take advantage of multimedia.

Vision

• Why stay chained to your computer?
• Why not break away, carry a system with you that augments your vision?
• We are spatial animals.
• Must match spatial representation with the cognitive structure of what you're doing, so that it actually makes sense.
• IDEO takes advantage of this through Project Rooms, engulfing the inhabitant with the richness of information.
• Heads-up display for fighter pilots has been augmenting vision with information for decades, but the consumer version for cars and eyeglasses have not been designed well.

Touch

• Tactile qualities of an object mean a lot to us.
• Cell phone - example of convergence of digital and physical interaction - sight, sound, touch.

Hiroshi Ishii

• Professor of the Tangible Media Group at MIT Media Lab
• Degrees in electronic and computer engineering.

Tangible Bits

• Tangible Bits give physical form to digital information, making bits directly manipulable and perceptible.
• GUI (graphical user interface): key feature is the separation of intangible representations from general purpose remote controllers, which enables flexibility and malleability.
• TUI (tangible user interface): key feature is to give physical form to information.

Abacus

• Simplest form of digital computation device.
• In a GUI, big divide between the pixel representation and the controllers like a mouse.
• Coouled manipulation and control.
  
• Even the sound it makes, can be a far away indication that someone is working.

Ping Pong

• Paddle handle melts into his body as an extension of his arm and hand.
• Player can consentrate on the main task, playing and hitting the ball.
• Good fit to the body is critical to making the interface transparent.

musicBottles

• http://tangible.media.mit.edu/projects/musicbottles/
• Using simple glassb ottles as containers and conduits of online digital information.
• Utilizing the simple affordance of opening and closing bottles.
• Can put anything inside the bottle.

Tangible Media Group

• Building connections between media and ading tactile qualities to the interface between people and computer systerms, demonstrating that multisensory and multimedia interactions can be fun and help us do things better.

Durrell Bishop

• Designed the game Tea Diving for a CD-ROM within an issue of design magazine, ID.
• Studied industrial design in London.
• In 1991, went to Royal College of Art for a master's in interaction design.
• Worked at IDEO twice, and his now on his own helping clients get the most out of highly interactive products and media.

Things Should Be Themselves!

• Digital things are often just black boxes with labels. The physical design should say what it is and what it does, like it is in everyday objects around us.
• One method - picking up tagged meangingful objects.
• Or tying in an interaction, a movement, with a function. It may be abstract at first, but the spacial relationships become memorable with time.
• Adding twists of humor and suprise.
• We remember things if they are repeated or if they are suprising.

Joy Mountford

• Engineering Pychology PhD from U of Illinois.
• Creater and Manager of the Human Interface Group at Apple Computer, that included inventing QuickTime.
  
• Founding principle of Idbias, an interaction design partnership.

QuickTime

• Goal for her at Apple was to release the human interface guidelines in 1986.
• To be used for Apple's developers for consistency.
• "Why would I want to do just paperwork on a computer?"
• Head presentation on dynamic documents presented by Professor Michael Mills and asked him to come for his sebatacle at Apple. Ended up staying at Apple for 6 years.
• Mike and Joy create many prototypes that eventually led to QuickTime.
• Put together lot s of illustrative samples of prototypes to show alternative video controls.
• User studies for test video controllers showed initial ideas were too sophisticated. The designers had in reality been designing for themselves.

QuickTime VR

• Joy maintained strong connections to academia throughout her career, teaching and bringing in interns.
• An intern took pictures from one point in an intire room.
• At the same time, the Human Interface Group released a version of the virtual sphere code, which allowed for a one-button mouse to change orientation of a 3D object.
• This was flipped inside out and "navigable movie" was created.
• Content matters - the first example was the intern's kitchen. Apple scaled the Golden Gate Bridge and took pictures from there to create a more interesting example for people.
• "Navigable movies" became the birth of what later became QuickTime VR.
• Joy had a knack for promoting these concepts.

The Bead Box

• Moved beyond video to audio and music.
• Left Apple Compute rto join Interval Reseach.
• Found 70 percent of the population think they're amteur musicians.
• Many people jam without being able to read music.
• This led to design of Bead Box, a device for people who want to make music but have not mastered a conventional instrument notation.
• Picked a bead to represent music because it is something small, collectible, holdable.
• See the piece that you want, put is somewhere and control that space.
• For younger children, beads represented body noises, for older rock and roll sounds.
• Appealed to young and old. Added recording capability as adults wanted personalized sounds.
• Design was too abstract for toy store shelves. Needed a captive audience to watch & listen.
• More and earlier input from business and marketing folks in the retail toy space might have helped the product succeed. Was too reseach-focused, so good concept did not succeed in market.

Bill Gaver

• Graduate student in psychology with Don Norman studying perception.
• Concluded that by thinking about the dimensions of sound-producing events, you should be able to make very simple mappings to events in the interface. Led to his work in Audiotory Icons.
• Developed SonicFinder at Apple.
• Became interested in broader issues concerning mediated social behavior.
  
• One of the founders of Equater Project, whose research involved design-driven reseach techniques called "Culture Probes" to uncover people's values and activities.

Designing Sound

• As an intern, started talking with Finder software group about adding sounds.
• Walked through Finder with programmer who taught him how to add sounds.
• At the time, 2 schools of though dominated work on the psychology of sound: (1) understanding how music works and (2) learning basic wasy the ear picks up sound.
• Bill thought that whn people listen to sound in the world, they did not listen to the dimensions that the psychologists were interested in.
• Wanted to make sounds that represent the physical world.
• Was alerted by a sound affects artists that his icons had emotion - humor.
• His research fell into the bakcground for 10 years until Finder 8.5 was released.

Affordances

• After 1.5 years as Intern then Consultant, moved to Xerox EuroPARC.
• In 1979, perception theorist JJ Gibson wrote his book, The Ecological Approach to Visual Perception.
• He asserted that percepton is designed for action, claiming that our whole evolution has been geared toward perceiving useful possibilities for action.
• Can also apply to visual elements on the computer.
  

Equator Project

• A 6-year interdisciplinary research collaboration.
• Bill's group looked at new technologies for the home.
• History Tablecloth: uses weight sensing to measure how long things have been left there. Objects left a long time have a halo under them. Surfaces are already used as a way to organize information. This idea was an accessory with a purposeful function.
• Key Table and Picture Frame: Measures the energy with which something is thrown down. Triggers reactions to emotional entransces in a variety of ways to warn others (ie. picture frame will tilt).
• Drift Table: Drifting image on coffee table. Zooms in around the object placed on it. Entertaining - soothing and engaging.

Designing Interactions:The Internet

Chapter Takeaways

• Ethnography before design.
• People don't want to interact with computers, people want to get something done.
• Three ways we think of interaction: manipulation, locomotion, and conversation.
• Immediacy is not appropriate for some contexts - efficiency vs. serendipity.
• Your building tools can become your product.
• Not being able to get your product acquired may be the best thing to happen to you.
• Design for people and the money will follow (this isn't so clear any more with the plethra of fantastic free apps struggling).
• Content companies can present interesting design challenges.
• Prototype and iterate.
• Introducing new services away from the main site can be insightful (though risky).
• Consider monologues vs dialogues (thinking web 2.0).
  
• Visual design should work with Interaction Design.
• Even arbitrary content can fit certain settings.
  

Stu Card (2002) referring to the search opportunities provided by the Internet: "It's as if I have a strap-on cortex!"

Terry Winograd

• Professor of Computer Science At Stanford.
• Developed program in software design, with a focus in HCI.
• BA in math (1966) and PhD in applied math at MIT.
  
• Taught in the AI lab in MIT.
• Looking at "How do you want to interact with a computer?"

The Internet or the Web?

• Internet: set of protocols for communicating between machines.
• HTTP (HyperText Transfer Protocol) was created for the Web.
• Internet was first developed for computer-savvy people.
• The Web was by physicists to communicate their preprints and papers along themselves.
• Then a surge of growth started to expand the web.
• Not being able to attract
  

Ubiquitous computing versus the Internet

• For the last 20 years, we've used the desktop and mouse. Very efficient for large quantities of text.
• Next, people don't want to interact with computers, people want to get something done.
  
• How do you make computers become invisible?
• Integrating computing by the inch (PDA), foot (notebook) and yard (big display).

From direction manipulation to "bring there"

• 3 main ways that we interact: manipulation, locomotion, and conversation.
• Conversation: command line.
• Manipulation: GUI.
• Locomotion: Set of places I can go and be, rather than objects I can do things with.
  

The immediacy advantage

• Advantage for some - type, click, buy.
• Not so for others - trying on clothes.

Google

• The culture is very user-empirical driven - "I don't know, let's put it up and experiment and see what people do."
• With the internet, prototypes can reach millions of users immediately.
• Devised the search engine for people, not for money.
• When adding ads asked, "What the way we can give something that's useful to users without getting in their face too much?"

Larry Page and Sergey Brin

• Founded Google in 1998.
• Both PhD CS students at Standford.

Successful Searching

• Started with an interest in data mining, the study of patterns and relationships in data, and went on to develop PageRank, a software tool to compare one Web page with another.
• Added a search engine called BackRub.
• Search has originally been a validation test for PageRank, but it all turned around - search becoming the primary focus, and PageRank becoming one of the tools that made it work.
• Project became bigger and Larry & Sergey began to need for hardware.
• Failed to interest the major portals of the day and reluctantly decided to make a go on their own.
• Raised a million dollars and in 1998 incorporated Google.
• By the end of the millennium, more than 3 million searches/day.
• Google started to express unique company culture - lava lamps and doors for desks. Very sophisticated computers though.
• In 2001, hired new CEO, Eric Schmidt, in order to start making profits.
• Will add new services off the main page, rather than on, so that it can get its own traction first.

Google Truths

1. Focus on the user and all else will follow. That user may not be you. Talk to them.
   
2. It's best to do one thing really, really well.
3. Fast is better than slow.
4. Democracy on the Web works.
5. You don't need to be at your desk to need an answer.
6. You can make money without doing evil.
7. There's always more information out there.
8. The need for information crosses all borders.
9. You can be serious without a suit.
10. Great just isn't good enough.

Steve Rogers

• Now is head of production for BBC New Media.
• In 2002, lead the team that designing the new homepage for BBCi.
• Industrial Designers, making VCRs for Philips Electronics. Realized it looked good, but no one knew how to use it! Worked to improve the interaction/usability.
• Started the Philips Multi Media Center in CA to look at impact of digital media on product design.

BBCi

• BBC has one of the most visited, one successful sites in the world. Massive amounts of content.
• Statements within the BBC at the moment was "Move from monologues to dialogue."
• Engage services for people who are not used to digital media: Need to make sure that site is intuitive to explore, people can find what they was easily, simple ways to comment etc.
  
• Do lots of ethnographic research.
• Moderation, especially on kid chat rooms, to ensure safety.

The Homepage

• Tough information architecture challenge to organize all that massive content.
• Gave anchor points by creating an internal consistent nav bar.
• The search bar considers that the visitors are British and assumes their search terms to be in British English.
• Made sure that the graphical design reflected the same professionalism and intimacy.
• Made the page adaptable - colors of the areas you visit most often brighter, while other dim.

Mark Podlaseck

• Philip Glass decided he wanted a Web site.
• Agencies wanted million-dollar project, so Mark decided to do it.
• Mart is at IBM's T. J. Watson Research Center.
• Research director was sympathetic, believe that there are a lot of large databases giving people navigation problems.
• This could be generalized for access and browsing, as well have high-profile cultural appeal.
• Composer and designer/programmer.

The Glass Engine

• Magical music place.
• Looked at TV & radio first, that nice feeling of flipping through a series of arbitrary content without having to make any decisions. (serendipity!)

Navigation

• "How do you represent a bunch of different attributes in a way that if you learn the representation of one, it works for all the rest?"
• Listened to customer call requesting types of music in order to determine relevant attributes.
• Prototyped and usability tested.
• (Author praises the final to look like the work for a professional graphic designer, but I disagree).

Designing Interactions: Services

Chapter Takeaways

• Service design can be a challenge when you don't control the entire experience.
• Avoid feature-creep.
• Design of the PDA evolved from PC, adapted to accommodate miniaturization.
• Cell phone evolved from simple calls, adapted to add functions.
• Go beyond the accepted audience.
• Take advantage of existing technology.
• Get valuable content.
• Providing services rather than products can be a way to attain sustainable design.
• Even services should be prototyped.
• Consider how you will create envy without a physical product.
• Limited empathetic research can lead to inspiration more than extensive market research.
  

Introduction

The Phone in the Hall

• Most of the service design was just focusing on training the operator on the other side.

A Modern Cellular Phone Service

• Many features and complex interactions.
• Many players including handset vendors, service provider, app designer etc.

Development of Phone Services

• First the rotary dials, then the push buttons (w/ # ad * for added functions).
• Office phone became feature over-loaded.
• Price plans contributed to budding phone habits.
• With the cell phone, competition between provided became more complicated.
• SMS in order to communicate in public places.
• Design of the PDA evolved from PC, adapted to accommodate miniaturization.
• Cell phone evolved from simple calls, adapted to add functions.
• The PDA is easier to use, but fewer people own them, so the telephone platform is starting to dominate in spite of the challenges posed by the interaction design.
• Difficulty in layered structure that takes away create control by single source.
• Opportunities and challenges in designing phone service that people can enjoy quickly.
  

Designing the i-mode service

• More than a quarter of Japan subscribes to i-mode service.

Keiichi Enoki and Mari Matsunaga

• Enoki was asked to start a spin-out from NTT DoCoMo.
• Enoki had a vision to market mobile phone services beyond business people.
• Very stringent interview process with internal people to build new team including "stress" interviews.
• Brought in Mari Matsunaga in 1997 to lead the content, had to pursue her vigorously.
• Mari insisted on larger screen to accommodate calendar view, shorthand icons etc.
• Mari recruited Takeshi Natsuno to help with internet-based service.

Takeshi Natsuno

• Political science and economics.
• Already great at computers.
• Was sent by Tokyo Gas for MBA at UPENN.
• Doesn't care about the technological possibility, but about the business opoortunities.

The i-mode Service

• Readjusted company to accommodate third party content providers.
  
• No content, no users.
• In 1997, proposed using the internet. Hard to convince information providers to design for small screen.
• Set up categories for content portfolio, then got to persuading vendors.
  
• Took 1.5 years and got support from 67 companies, starting service in 1999. A lot back then.
• Today, the number is more than 50,000.
• Started with support from the most conservative guys (i.e. banks).
• Was able to win over the entertainment guys only after a subscriber base.
• Handset is only part of the full value chain, a single company cannot dominate the value chain. i-mode is in the middle, unable to create the content or design the handset.
  
• Only required minimal specification from the handset design vendors, not to limit their creativity - i-mode button and directional arrows.
• Focus on making great UI.
• Tried to make the browser resemble the PC browser.
• Believes success due to internet way of thinking rather than the telecoms way of thinking to implement service. (very wise)
  

A Cautionary Tale of a Soft Drink

• Chiho Sasaki decided to run a single usability test for using the i-mode to interact with vending machine.
• 30 Minutes later, she gets a drink. Fail.
• The problem was that no single organization has direct influence over the entire experience.
• Best way to get over this hurdle is to look at what people want and need as a 1st priority.

Live|Work

• Service innovation and design company based on London.
• When you deepen an interaction beyond an interface and think about the network, you eventually end up at the service.
• By designing from a service instead of a product perspective, they are promoting use over consumption.

Starting Live|Work

• Think of services as things that people use rather than own.
• There is a connection between service provision and sustainability. (me: yes, there is. i don't want or need the energy and physical devices to store my music, wish i could use someone else's)
  

Designing Services, A Glossary

1. Service design: The design of intangible experiences that reach people through many different touch-points, and that happen over time.
2. Service ecologies: Process we use to establish a systematic view of the service ad the context it will operate in.
3. Touch-point: Tangibles that make up the the total experience of using a service.
4. Service envy: Enable people to express who they are through the use of service, instead of the ownership of things.
5. Evidencing: A newspaper article describing a service, other people evaluations etc.
6. Experience prototyping: Design touch points, set the scene, place, and time. Participant suspend their disbelief.
7. Service experience models: Represent intangible experiences, and need to employ formats to convey the experience and the functions of the service in an immediate way. Make it fake, so that people focus on the concept, instead of the form factor.
   
8. Service blueprinting: Describes the service in enough detail to implement and maintain it.

Fran Samalionis

• Leader of Service Design and Innovation practice at IDEO.
• Philosophy - 'keep our head in the clouds and feet on the ground'.
• Background in astronomy and electronics.
• "Some customers are used to an existing product, it does not even cross their mind to ask for a new solution" (similar to the Ford quote i like)

Service Innovation

• Encourages human factors research for service innovation.
• Difference between market and human factors research: Market research uses large numbers of subjects, or participants, in order to reveal statistically viable truth, but it is unlikely to yield inspiration. Empathic research methods, on the other hand, if skillfully used, can yield much inspiration from small number of subjects.

Process

• Observations to insights to framework to ideas to iterative prototypes to solution.
• Framework bounds the problem, reducing complexity.

Designing Interactions: Play

Chapter Takeaways

• Take lessons from game design into the greater interactive sphere.
• Hire people who are crazy about what they do.
• Sometimes it's alright to design for yourself as the user.
• Determine your audience and talk to them.
• Provide a smooth transition from novice to expert user.
• Children don't need your toy, but will play with it if it is fun and their parents buy it.
  
• Creative must merge with market demands, including price and timing.
• Girls also like to play, just with a different kind of game.
• Think about how people will perceive your design tools, perhaps that can be your product.
• Support your teams, and the bottom line will follow.
• Enable your users to pursue their goals.
• Fit the design into the contemporary world.
  

Bill Gordon

• BA in Literature and Drama at Yale.
• MBA at Stanford.
• Joined EA in marketing, is no CCO and Executive VP.
• EA first video game publisher to treat game developers like rock start, made it easy to attract best designers.

Starting Electronic Arts

• EA presumed interactive entertainment was going to be as big as music and video.
  
• Driven by belief that "play" is a core human value.
• 1982, Tim Mott became 9th cofounder to join, as VP of technology.
• Chose name, Electronic Arts, carefully. Wanted to represent the developers as artists.
• Only hired people who were crazy about games.
• Spent a lot of time with avid game players in order to understand likes and dislikes.

A Taxonomy of Games

• The interests of the players (car, simulations, war etc.)
• The age of the players (i.e. preadolescences , teenagers, adults).
• The gender of the players (girls are more likely to play w/ boy characters, but boys are beginning to open up to girl characters).
• Interactive formats (PC, Mac, handheld etc.)
• Brands (tend to excel at different types of games).
• Number of players (multi-player is getting increasingly more popular).
• Input Devices (simple for novice, complex for expert, specific for some types).

Brendan Boyle

• Part of creative design at IDEO.
• Sit close together for better communication, also leaves space for workshops.
• Kids come in weekly to try new toys.
• BSME, and then went to Goodyear.
• Product Design program at Stanford.
• Started Skyline to develop ideas for toys and then brought it back to IDEO.

Inventing Toys and Games

"[Children] may have more fun with pot, pans, and a wooden spoon than the latest hot toy or game. In a market sense, the words "toy" and "game" mean a plaything that an adult is willing to purchase, rather than just an item that a child wants to play with, which would include almost anything." - Brenden Boyle 2004

• Brainstorm game ideas and then make prototypes to show kids.
• Must be below a specific pricepoint in order to sell.
• The turnaround is typically 6 months, with the target being Christmas season.
• Despite having sold 125 concepts, still surprised when a new one sells because everything has to line up.

Examples of Brendan Boyle's Designs

• Aerobie Football: inspired from Charlie Brown.
• Finger Blaster: build from existing materials, but for a new use.
• Fib Finder: include technology to compete for notice with Mattel and Hasboro.

Brenda Laurel

• Bringing theater and computers.
• Show people for to use enactment to inform design.
• Researcher, designer, writer, teacher.

Games for Girls

• Trying to understand the difference between the sexes.
• Wanted to create a world girls could affiliate with.
• Girls prefer a narrative construction.
• Built Purple Moon.

Will Wright

• Best-known guru in game design.
• Designer of Sims, best-selling game of all time for personal computers.
• Thinks through his design decision and present an analysis in simple, accessible terms.
• Games with a reputation for intelligent and creative design, with a sense of social responsibility.
• Acquired by EA.

Models

• First game in 1983, Raid on Bungling Bay required Will to create cities for players to bomb in the game. Loved the city planning so much, that it eventually led to SimCity.
• The publishers got impatient for SimCity, not understanding that is was more of a toy, and less of a game.
• Will met Jeff Braun, an entrepreneur, who loved the idea.
• They started their own company, Maxis, to make the game.
• Started slowly, but took off when Time write a full-page article about it.
• Went public in 1995.
• The pressure led to the release of several poor games.
• In 1997, acquired by EA.
• EA cut top-management and re-focused on best-selling products, saving the company.

The Sims

• Luc Barthelet, new general manager for Maxis under EA, set Will up with the best possible talent to develop his ideas.
• Was excited to focus on his idea of building a game based on contemporary life. Books were about contemporary life, why not software?
  
• The game that would build on the processes and strategies that people use everyday.
• Got a lot of casual players who did not normally play computer games.
• Ten to fifty yeard olds - grandparents would play with their grandkids.
• Anyone can customize, regardless of computer knowledge.
• Game is adaptable and adaptive.

Designing Games

• Starting point for designing a game is to engage players in deciding what their goals are.
• Designer has choices about speed and scope at project start.
• Concentrate not just on the successful interaction, but also on the failure of it.
  If you can make failure a big part of the entertainment, people will get a blast from it.
• Every game has overlapping loops of interaction.
• Weakest element is now less likely to be graphics and must more likely to be behavioral - these technologies are going to be a big focus over the next 10 years.
• Lessons to Interactive Design:
  
• Must be enjoyable.
• Engage the imaginations, and users successful a little bit at a time.
• Controls must be fun and easy to use.
• Path from inexperienced to expert.
• Our design should relate to the designs around us.

Designing Interactions: Adopting Technology

Chapter Takeaways

• Three phases of adoption - Enthusiast, Professional and then Consumer.
• Importance of enjoyability and easy-of-use grow with each phase.
• Aestheics also come into play more and more with each phase.
  
• Talk to the users for unique design insights.
• Once interaction design is adopted by large group of people, hard to change.
• Design for the experience, not just the product.
• Think about packaging service with product.
  
• A good prototype can serve as a selling demo to client.
• Invite engineers and designers to observe the usability testing.
• Interaction Design is making technology fit people.
• Future products will react to the environment and people around them.
• To build good products, you must have a solid technocal foundation.
• And of course, engage passionate people!
  

David Little

• PhD in Electrical Engineering.
  
• Interested in designing graphical interactions.
• Designed display for the Alto.
• Project leader for Star.
• In 1982, left Xerox to form Metaphor Computer, which was acquired by Microsoft in 1991.
• In 1992, set up and lead a new research lab, Interval Research, to stir up new thinking for commercial possibilities.
• Now a venture capitalist.

Three Phases of Adoption

1. Hobby: Enthusiast Phase - "Exploit me!"
2. Work: Professional Phase - "Help me work!"
3. Life: Consumer Phase - "Enjoy me!"

Enthusiast, Professional, Consumer

• Enthusiast - even a single inventor can design for them.
• Professional - much more stringent requirements on performance, reliability, usefulness and usability. Does not need to be easy to use. Does not need to be enjoyable (I don't agree).
• Consumer - Enjoyable and easy to use.

Learning from Kids

• In 1994, sent out a touring test at "Lollapalooza".
• One finding contradicted many prior assumptions. Adoption as children may not lead to use as adults. Example - talking on the phone 24/7 is cool as kids with curfews and seen a uncool as 18+ w/ lives.

The Car

• Many attempts to devise a steering mechanism before a steering wheel was established.
• Enthusiast phase between the time that the engine was attached to a carriage to 1908 when the ford first came out that could serve both consumers and professionals.
  
• Once a complicated set of interactions is learned by a large population, resistance to change sets in.
• Interactions have incrementally become easier & safer, but largely the same.
• We now love exercising our driving skills. Take pride in it and enjoy the experience.
  

Digital Photography

• Enthusiast - 35mm camera that was taken into space by early astronauts in the fifties.
• Consumer - point a shoot (not replacing professional, but simply adding to it.)
• Experience of photography is much broader than the camera itself.

Mat Hunter

• Studied interaction design at Royal College of Art.
• Joined IDEO in 1995, key to the development of an interaction architecture for Kodak.
• In 1999, became head of Interaction Design @ IDEO London.
• Currently head of the London office of IDEO.

Interaction Architecture

• When asked to redesign the Kodak carema, Mat knew that they needed to look beyond the device and into the entire photo taking/printing/viewing experience.
• Needed to build an "Interaction Architecture", a framework on which developers would add cameras and services over time.
• Jane, a Human Factors researcher, summed up the opportunities for consumer digital photography:
1. Readiness to capture.
2. Information at capture.
3. Creative control.
4. Organization.
5. Ways to display.
• Techniques used in Human Factors work:
• The system perspective - camera at the center.
• Scenarios.

User Experience Prototype

• Mat could not work with developers on the camera.
• As a solution, the team aimed for 3-5 year out technology, hoping the dev team would down-sample as needed.
• Developed a working prototype so that the engineers and designers would feel engaged.
• Three modes, not to overwhelm the user at once.
• Show the images on the display.
• Reviewers sighted is as easy-to-use, "a camera for the rest of us".

Rikako Sakai

• Won scholarship to attend the Interaction Design Institute Ivrea.
• BA in Industrial Design.
  
• Thesis on "wearables".
• Gained experience in Interaction Design and Human Factors through Canon.

Canon PhotoStitch

• Brought in to develop the 3rd version of PhotoStitch.
• Prior to her, the engineers did not work with Interaction Designers on product.
• To start, she had all the engineers observe a usability test.
• Improved navigation by allowing back and fwd at will, rather than strictly linear.
• Watched the user behavior and adapted the device to it.
• Fought with designers on individual icons, winning some, loosing others.
• Once the adoption of technology reaches the consumer phase, the skills of Interaction Designers and psychologists are much more essential.

Printers for Digital Photography

• Printers evolved from noisy machines to quiet gray boxes to consumer maintainable devices. Next came the aesthetics that fit into the domestic environment.

David Kelley

• BS in Electrical Engineering from Carnegie Mellon.
• First worked at Boeing in Seattle where we was to design the lavatory "occupied" signs.
• Left for MS in Product Design at Stanford, graduated in 1978.
• Started a design agency with friends from Stanford which later became IDEO.
• Left in 2002,and now is at Stanford while staying connected with IDEO as chairman.

Design Adopts Technology

• Interaction Design is making technology fit people.
• First started designing a lot of input devices. Excited because it was new and personal.
• Significant development was the integration of hardware and software into products in which the way people interact with the product could drive the whole solution (i.e. PDA, cell phone).
• Wanted the product to meet the behavior and need.
• Then along came the information appliance - the idea being that technology-enabled devices would start to fit into everyday lives. Believes yet to come. Products that react to us.
  
• The Internet makes the market more perfect - find the people who want the products and services more easily.
• Believes the number of places where the entire experience is in play, is growing.
• Teach designers to be interrogators.
• Designing experiences, rather than just objects.

Paul Mercer on the iPod

• The complete service : ipod + itunes was key to success.
• Programmer.
  
• Worked for Apply since 20-year-old in 1987.
• In 1991, explored concepts for hand-held macs and the software to go with them.
• In 1994, left to found Pixo.
• Clients included Nokia & Samsung for phones and Apple for iPod.
• Apple acquaired Pixo after the 1st generation of iPod.
  
• In 2002, found Inventor to create enabling structures for ubiquitous computing.
• (update from web, in 2007, Paul joined Palm).

Pixo

• Paul Mercer was always passionate about building postable electronic devices.
• In 1994, thought that the capability at Apply was no longer the differentiating ingredient.
• Left to start up a company called Pixo to create the building blcoks for the next generation of devices and to build the UIs for those devices.

iPod and iTunes

• Why is the iPod so great compared to the competition? The culture of being able to build good products.
• Apple started workon music by acquiring SoundJam to build iTunes and improving it over the years.
• In 2001, launched iPod that synchronized through high-speed bus with iTunes.
• In 2003, launched the iTunes music store.
• Very slowly developed iTunes for Windows.
• Claims that Pixo did not design the iPod, simply the building blocks for it.

The Interaction Design Challenge

• Recently started Inventor.
• Wants to democratize the design of better user interfaces for portable devices.
• Develop tools for developers.

Designing Interactions: From the Desk to the Palm

Chapter Summary

• Do not aspire to replicate the old medium,take advantage of the new one.
• Metaphors are especially useful at the beginning, but can be eliminated with time.
• Simplicity is necessary at the beginning, but complexity can be added with time, as long as it is done well.
  
• Try things early.
  
• Know the market. Know when to copy (i.e. PC-compatible software), and when to break the mold.
• Know the users. Geeks are rarely it.
  
• A great demo can make your success.
• Speak the language of your contractors.
• Take risks.
• Interaction design is in the physical as well as the digital.
• People will go out on the line for an idea if they are excited about it.
• Understanding the brain helps to design for people.
• Set your design goals from the start.
• Modes = bad.
• Learning from an unsuccessful product can be valuable in itself.
• A company must continue to invest in R&D to keep its staff.
  

Designing the laptop and the palm pilot was about shrinking the computer so that you can take it with you.

Alan Kay

• Transformed by McLuhan's Understanding Media (1964) and the concept "the medium is the message". Nature of people to be reshaped by tools.
• Recognized as the father of the laptop.
• Wanted to design computer for kids but because of price-point is mostly known for Smalltalk and other software contributions.

Learning

What I hear, I forget.
What I say, I remember.
What I do, I understand.
- Lao Tse

• Designers know that creative work is more likely to succeed when they experiment before they try to understand.

Luggables

• Alan Kay could not get approval of his luggable to be manufactured by Xerox.
  
• Osborne, 1982, most famous luggable.
• Failed when did not bring an IBM-compatible machine in time to prevent bankruptcy.
• Compaq 2 brought the company into Fortune 500 by 1986.
• Dynalogic Hyperion released just before Compaq lost because it was not 100% PC compatible.
• GRiD Compass computer in 1982.

John Ellenby

• Worked on multiprocessor system for communications and process control while holding faculty position in CS Dept at University of Edinburgh.
• Signed up with Xerox to build the first 25 Altos, then to develop Denver.
• In 1977, was responsible for "Futures Day" a demo to show off the achievement of PARC research to top management.
• The demo was a success, but management continued to focus on document reproduction, causing an exodus from PARC.

Developing the First Laptop

• The conversation that 1st inspired John Ellenby was with a top executive who insisted that he needed a computer that could fit into half of his briefcase.
• This became the design brief for the GRiD Compass Computer.
• Had to start a company to do this.
• When trying to get a small modem, the company said they could not do it. But a person from the GRiD team and his counterpart from Racal Vadic, the vendor side, had a side conversation and made it happen.
  
• A Japanese guy named, Glen Fukuda, excited about the GRiD idea, arranged with Sharp to come and eventually make the screen necessary.
• Company founders carried bricks in their briefcases in order to determine the max allowed weight of laptop.
• GRiD launched in 1982 and was highly acclaimed.
• Asked Bill Gates to develop special version of MS-DOS for 2nd version of GRiD. The speed at which this was done saved the company.
  
• A Fire Attack game attracted an otherwise reluctant user-group.
• The interaction design advances for this computer were both physical and digital.

Jedd Hawkins

• Designing mobile computers and working on brain theory.
• Developed the first tablet PC, and GRiDpad and then found Palm Computing.
• Went on to found Handspring, and culminating in the Treo platform.

GRiD

• Started in marketing. Was challenged with selling a computer for $8,150 n 1982 to business executives who did not use computers.
  
• Left to study neuroscience graduate full time.
• In school, while getting interested in pattern recognition got the idea for a tablet PC and came back in 1988 to manage the GRiDpad.
• Important not to focus on the "paperness", but on the electronic or back-end. (Take advantage of the medium).
• In 1992, after building GRiDpad into a successful business, went on to work on GRiD Convertible - a laptop and tablet in one. Learned that people did not want this combination.

Bert Keely

• Wants to bring 'tablet mode' to personal computer - the ability to use it with one hand, while holding it with another.
• Engineering degree from Stanford.
• Has been the "architect of tablet PCs and mobility" at Microsoft since 1998.
• Wants people to recognize and appreciate the affordance of a tablet PC. Thinks with XP2, some users are there.
  

Displays

• Developed ClearType, a program that takes advantage of the red, green and blue subpixels,to smooth the fonts and create the best word shapes on the screen.
• Challenge of pen-based displays is to sense the location of the pen tip accurately.

Portability

• Stylus input must allow you to interact with your computer with only one hand.
• Should be handy way to carry all of your visual information (e.g. maps, photos, email).

Pen and Paper

• The design of the personal computer has outgrown its current metaphors.
• Believes that stylus will develop the same way - first simulating pen/paper then evolving unique characteristics.
• There needs to be immediate recognition of value for tablet over laptop.
• There are many different pen feels, making it difficult to think about how a should stylus feel.
• Believes it is faster to use stylus instead of a keyboard before you are doing many more things at the same time - writing, pointing, editing etc.

Palm Computing (Jeff Hawkins)

• Jeff Hawkins believed that the future of portable computers was smaller devices that appealed to consumers.
• Founded a startup.
• Start by writing software for other PDA's.
• Frustrated by the limitation of the other devices, he designed his own.

Design Criteria For the PalmPilot

• Size: fit into a shirt pocket.
• Price: $299, so that consumers can afford it. Very high at the time.
• Synchronization w/ desktop computer. Other devices had it as an add-on, but since everyone needs it, he put it in the device.
• Speed: design goal of no wait cursors.
• These 4 criteria solved a lot of problems prevalent on other personal computers and PDAs.

Graffiti

• Handwriting recognition was hard to reach.
• Decided that people don't mind learning a new tool as long as it helps them perform the task. Pride themselves on learning as long as the tool is consistent, learnable, has a good model and it's reliable.
• Helped to understand how the brain works. It likes consistency.

Rob Haitani

• Insists on putting people first.
• Worked at Palm.
• Went on to lead Interaction Design for Handspring.
• Understand what really matters before you act.
  

Interaction Design for Palm OS

• Rob led the team towards simplicity and pushed back against excessive features.
• Tested the idea with fake device mock-ups.
• Consumers liked data syncing but did not care for email (1995). Consumers did not like the same things as the geeks building the device.
• Rob and the team designed with 4 guidelines:
  1. Less is more
  2. Avoid adding features
  3. Strive for fewer steps
  4. Simplicity is better than complexity.

The "Zen of Palm"

• This philosophy emphasized the speedy access of the most frequently used features. Top features directly on the screen and then others in a menu. No modes.
• First understand the customer, the prioritize ruthlessly.

The Palm Product Line

• At the big demo launch, projector failed. Jeff talked about the demo instead, so that even when time was up, audience insisted on seeing it on the fixed projector.
• Microsoft became angry and both companies exchanged law suits over product naming.
• Microsoft also added a lot more features, but Jeff did not believe that it added much value.
• To compete, Palm hired IDEO to design the hardware case to be beautiful, as Microsoft did not build hardware.

Dennis Boyle

• From a family of scietists, engineers and designers.
• Studied Industrial Design and Mechanical Engineering.
• Takes a new prototype with him to any meeting.
• His collection of interesting products has inspired the "Tech Box". A combination of parts and materials library, database and Web site, which is available at all major IDEO offices.

Palm V

• Linked the PalmPilot because it was smaller than the existing Newton.
• Goal was to build slimmer device to attract women and to make it easier to fit in pocket.
• Something that was elegant and did not broadcast that it was a piece of technology.
• Used the makes of Canon to build the metal case.
• Added rails on the sides so that people could easily attach add-ons.

Handspring

• Palm was sold to US Robots, which was then sold to 3Com for its modem business. Even though model business was almost worthless and Palm was worth quite a bit, 3Com did not invest in its expansion.
• Jeff, Rod and others left when it was clear that Palm would not be spun out. They founded Handspring.
• Jeff wanted to build a wireless device, but thought it would fail, so the team decided to make a slot that could accommodate anything.
• Lots of people made add-ons, and lots of PDAs sold, but the add-ons themselves did not sell.
• It was a learning process about different radios.

eyemodule

• Continued to use IDEO.
• A camera that could be plugged into the slot. As soon as it's in,the device would go into camera mode. No button pressed required.
• Useful to demonstrate the versatility of the slot.

Combining PDA and Cell Phone

• When 1st developing the PDA, the technology was too prohibitive to made a good phone on a good PDA. Five year later, this could be done.
• Highlight features: Type 3 or 4 letters to find a contact name, use speaker phone with organizer, turn off ringer while in pocket, QWERTY
• People don't mind doing more things as long as it is done well.
  

Designing Interactions: My PC

Chapter Takeaways

• Your product must be affordable.
• Keep a small team for agility and creativity.
• The backend and UI work together and must be developed together.
• Products must be designed with people in mind.
• Know your target user group.
  
• Prototype.
• Designs taken for granted today are someone's innovation (e.g. menu at top).
• Understand your contractors (e.g. manufacturing, programming).
• Think about the physical and emotional experiences of your products.
• Use beauty with function.

Introduction

The Low Road or the High Road?

• GUI won out after the price point was low enough.

Apple Lisa and Mac

• Mac software was built by only a few people.
• Lisa, document-based, failed commercially but was provided important interaction design precedents.
• Mac had to sacrifice features, but made up for it in design-flare.
  

Microsoft Windows

• Despite its own pricey hardware, Apply chose to continue developing on it rather than making its software available for the PC platform.
• Apple sued Microsoft for the use of the interface, but lost and almost went under until Steve Jobs came back to take over.

Bill Atkinson

• Passion for nature photography.
• Graduate student of Neuroscience at University of Washington.
• With Apple 1978-1990, design and development of Lisa, MacPaint and HyperCard.

Apple Lisa

• Loves problem solving and aesthetic values (loved chemistry and photography).
• Talks about making this more humane (i.e. had professor buy his students bean bag chairs to the disgruntlement of the department).
• Programmed on the side.
• Led the design of the graphics and UI for Lisa.
• Bill would offer ideas and Larry would test it.
• Insisted on white background despite power drain, in order to obey WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get).
• Lisa was for an office worker, whereas Mac was aimed at a 14-year-old boy.
• Research at PARC had very little influence on the Lisa, contrary to popular belief.

Pull-Down Menus

• Bill and Larry partnered, Bill programmed at night, Larry tested in the day. Easy to get subject as few in the company had used a computer before.
• Was developed 1979-1983.
• It was a breakthrough to put the menu at the top instead of the bottom (amongst others)!

Apple Mac

• Design team for mac was kept at 10 people (vs 100 for Lisa).
• Lots of iteration.
• With Mac, the character of the company fell into place.

HyperCard

• Prototyping tool that was similar to a web browsed, except it was tied to your hard drive.

Apple Mice

• Englebart's original mouse needed considerable dexterity to master. Xerox PARC had to redesign.
• Apple outsourced the physical design of the mouse to Hovey-Kelly Design.
• Cheaper, only one button, no pad to roll on, withstand millions of clicks, more flexible cord.

Paul Bradley

• Industrial Designer

Microsoft Mouse & Tests

• Testing the ergonomics of mouse design with users.
• Combination of user testing and rapid prototyping key to success.
  

Industrial Design Development

• This is not just a device that has to match the keyboard, it is a device for the human hand.
• Went to Japan to manufacture. Were able to convince the manufacturers to produce under the tight deadline by explaining the process needed - helped to have Jim, who was knowledgeable in tooling and manufacturing.

Bill Verplank

• Draws as he talks.
• PhD from MIT in man-machine systems.
• XEROX 1978-1986
• Deign consultant 1986-1992.
• Helped to establish Ivrea.

How do you...?

• Believes that they are 3 questions to answer as an Interaction Designer.
• How do you do? Physical movements required.
  
• How do you feel? The emotions that the feedback leaves you with.
• How do you know? Show a map, to understand what is happening and a path, to show them what to do.

Interaction Design Paradigms

• Intelligence
• Tool
• Media
• Life
• Vehicle
• Fashion

Interaction Design Process

1. Motivation - errors or ideas
2. Meaning - metaphors and scenarios
3. Modes - models and tasks
4. Mapping - displays and controls

Cordell Ratzlaff

• Managed Human Interface Group for the design of Macintosh System Software for 5 years.
• MAC OS X was completely design driven, based on what novice users would need.
• Graduated with degree in psychology.
• Graduate studies in Industrial Design.
• 1st job was at NASA Ames Research Center.

Mac OS X

• Arrived at Apple in 1990, who were doing well with 26 percent market share, bigger than IBM.
• Couple years later, Apple was playing catch-up with too many products and loosing its identity.
  
• Around this time, Cordell moved into system software development and took responsibility for the Human Interface Group for Mac OS.
• Worked with sound design company to incorporate sound into the system interactivity.
• Apple bought NeXTSTEP for the new operating system, and had to revamp the UI as a result.
• Steve Jobs came back and carried Apple away from being engineering-focused.
• As a result, Cordell was able to design a better UI, including shadows, finder etc.
• Changed the type of customers they were focusing on, allowed to push through with desired design. From developers to novice computer users.
  
• Cordell changed apphearance to be fresh and fun - collected magazine ads for liquor. Wanted the new UI design to complement the new Industria Design. Wanted to do so with added value.
• Believe that design should be driven first by user needs and desires.

The Time Dimension

• Ability to sort information by time.
• Windows arranged in order of last accessed.
• Trash can changing functions relevant to the object being dragged (i.e. eject).

What's Next?

• Search over hierchical navigaton.
• Desktop metaphor will go away.
• Perhaps an agent model.